Fonzie Movie Review: Lady Bird

Written by: Chan Wen Jun

Lady Bird – A review and analysis

Upon finishing Lady Bird, I was in disbelief that the entire movie’s runtime was only a mere 94 minutes when what almost felt like one’s entire teenage life had just flown by. Lady Bird is a coming-of-age film about a teenage girl, Christine ‘Lady Bird’ McPherson, and her turbulent relationship with her mother as she undergoes her final year of high school. Now that may not sound like material for an engaging movie, but the brilliance in the film lies in how director Greta Gerwig manages to turn the seemingly mundane aspects and relationships of a girl’s teenage life into a heartfelt and nostalgic collage of one’s teenage years.

Truth be told, I had difficulty even writing a summary of the film initially as its main premise is never clearly laid out due to the film not having a clear inciting incident. Most movies and stories have an obvious moment that sets the rest of the story in motion but Lady Bird doesn’t. Perhaps one could point that the opening car scene sets up that Lady Bird is unsatisfied with her life in Sacramento, California, and seeks to attend a prestigious college on the East Coast of the U.S. But it is not clear how it drives the narrative of the film as much of the film’s runtime does not really focus on Lady Bird trying to achieve those goals. Most of the film instead chooses to display the little memorable moments that make up Lady Bird’s life such as theater practice, class, and just normal everyday life.

This is exemplified in how the first act of the movie plays out by setting up Lady Bird’s relationships with the people around her and her desires; Lady Bird wants to have a boyfriend, she wants to participate in the school play, she wants to get with the popular kids, and most of all, she wants to attend college on the East Coast. However, she achieves most of these goals by the end of the first act; the last of which is waiting on her college applications. Yet the film seemingly moves forward as her life moves on; she falls in and out of love, she participates in school theater but becomes disillusioned, she gets with the popular kids and finds out they aren’t as cool as she thought, and her relationship with her family becomes more complicated. Despite the movie using these very clichéd coming-of-age tropes, it doesn’t come across as generic because it doesn’t paint these incidents as the be-all and end-all of the movie by tying down the film’s plot with a specific goal or premise. The events in the film simply ‘happen’ as it were, not as some huge plot point or story arc, but merely as events over the course of Lady Bird’s last year of high school. The story is simply driven by the tide of time as her senior year progresses.

This unique plot structure would be boring if it were not threaded by the realistic portrayal of the nuances of relationships between family and friends. This is in part due to director and writer Greta Gerwig’s meticulous attention to detail towards her screenplay and the amazing actors’ performances For instance, when Lady Bird asks her mom if she can buy a magazine, her mom replies that they can go down to the public library to read it instead, but Lady Bird doubles down and says that she wants to read it in bed, prompting her mom to quip that its only ‘something that rich people do’ and that their family is not rich. This short scene reveals a sense of relatability to those of us that grew up low to the middle class. Audiences have also pointed out the scene in which Lady Bird and her mom are arguing in a thrift store but immediately stop arguing when her mom finds a beautiful dress as being extremely relatable to mothers and daughters, almost to a tee.

Another way the film sidesteps its clichés is by making the characters feel real with motives and emotions of their own but still identifiable through their roles as stock characters. For example, when Lady Bird reveals to Jenna Walton, the popular and rich girl of her class that she had been lying about her upper-class background to befriend her, Jenna doesn’t lash out, she is merely confused as to why someone would lie about their upbringing as Jenna herself grew up wealthy so she can’t put herself in Lady Bird’s shoes. Or when Lady Bird meets Kyle Scheible, a popular handsome boy who behaves aloof and pretentious. It is then implied that Kyle is going through emotional issues of his own as he is coping with the cancer diagnosis of his father by behaving aloof and emotionally distant to numb his emotional distress.

However, I believe that this nuanced approach to character building is best shown in Lady Bird’s relationship with her mother. The film establishes their relationship as loving but often rife with disagreements through events that occur throughout the film. Despite Lady Bird behaving like what one would call a ‘brat’ towards her family and her mother being too overbearing at times, the film never takes sides in its portrayal of their relationship. Both characters have their own emotional moments that feel astonishingly real, as even I sometimes felt that my own relationship with my own mom had been put right on the screen. One of the ways the film does this is through naturalistic dialogue, for instance by having characters talk over each other and stumbling over words. This could be traced to director Gerwig’s past involvement with the mumblecore film scene which emphasizes similar dialogue. This creates a realistic depiction of how certain real-life conversations occur, especially in frantic arguments.

Due to the film’s relatively loose plot structure that depicts one event to the next without a clear sense of time, audiences can lose track of the time between events and how far into the year the characters are. The film grounds our sense of time with holidays and school events like prom so that one does not feel too lost. But the feeling of not knowing exactly which part of the year events occur is intentional as it is meant to feel dreamy and hazy like memories in a photo album as stated by Gerwig and lead actress Saoirse Ronan. A part of how Gerwig achieved this is by the film is partly autobiographical. Gerwig sets the film in Sacramento, where she grew up. The film is set in 2002, approximately when Gerwig herself would have come of age. Lady Bird also attends a Catholic high school much like Gerwig. These autobiographical elements allow the film to tell a coming-of-age story that is somehow both extremely specific in its detail but wide-reaching in its relatability.

The films 2002 is also grounded by the intentional choice of period music that was popular around the time. Songs like ‘Hand In My Pocket’ by Alanis Morissette, ‘Cry Me A River' by Justin Timberlake, and ‘Crash Into Me’ by Dave Matthew’s Band which were songs that Gerwig loved as a teenager feature prominently in the film to remind the audience of the time period as well as to lend authenticity to the setting. The film also calls to mind the Iraq War which was a major global event of the 2000s to ground the film in its time period as conversation topics and news reports about it crop up in the movie every now and again. The decision to reference the political events of that era also serves to ground the film and hint at the uncertainty of the political and economic turmoil in America at the time as Lady Bird navigates her own troubles while growing up. In relation to the music, however, I think the movie’s use of music really shines when the main soundtrack composed by Jon Brion underscores the emotional highs and lows of the movie. The little piano motifs that are repeated throughout the soundtrack and played during the final climactic scene of the movie when Lady Bird comes to an epiphany about her mother and her hometown truly brings the scene to its emotional peak.

The notable similarity between the use of rainbow pastel colors in the movie (left) and Wayne Thiebaud’s paintings (right) - Credit: River Bend Farms by Wayne Thiebaud from Christie’s (top right), Cosmetic Lady by W. Thiebaud from Philips (bottom right)

The parallels between Thiebaud’s use of oranges, browns, greens, and yellows and the film is striking - Credit: River Intersection by W. Thiebaud from Crocker Art Museum(top left)

The film makes prominent use of warm gold, brown, green colors and ambient lighting for most scenes in Sacramento. The film’s color palette also consists of soft pastel colors that production designer Chris Jones says brings to mind the paintings of Wayne Thiebaud, a Californian artist known for his colorful depictions of everyday items and scenery. Cinematographer Sam Levy has also cited influence from the work of photographer Lise Sarfati, known for her dreamy and evocative portraits of life, youth, and femininity. The film was initially intended to be shot on Super 16 mm film but was eventually shot on digital due to budget constraints. Hence, enhanced digital noise and careful color grading were employed in post-production to evoke the filmic quality desired. These visual aspects serve to truly elicit the film’s feeling like a distant but still reachable collection of memories.

A comparison between the work of Lise Safarti (left) and stills from the movie (right)

Credit: A24, Artpil and Artsy

The film’s deliberately warm color grading and use of ambient light - Credit: A24, Alex Bickel and Color Collective

All Lady Bird stills are credited to A24

Ultimately, the unconventional plot structure, the detailed but minimalist screenplay, nuanced characters, autobiographical elements, music choice, and the vivid cinematography all come together to create something familiar but refreshingly authentic in its presentation. These elements expose a vulnerability to the characters and setting that never comes across as trying too hard, but strikingly human and almost universally relatable. The movie never glamorizes youth either, as it displays all the aspects of it from the emotional troubles as well as the moments to be cherished. The film’s relatively playful tone belies the poignancy of the film’s ending which displays fleeting youth and your hometown as something to be appreciated as you might not notice how much you loved it until it's gone. I imagine the film would hit home especially hard to those of us that are in the midst of leaving for college. If you are in the mood for a coming-of-age film that is equal parts dramatic, funny and poignant, make sure Lady Bird is the one that you watch.

Sources, references, and other relevant material

How Does "Ladybird" Feel So Real? - Video Essay - https://youtu.be/Tay2AoUdUXE

Story Structure in Lady Bird - https://youtu.be/w8Xmz4IXbkM

Lady Bird: Authenticity in Filmmaking - https://youtu.be/1HQ9XITKduM

Lady Bird - Portraying High School Through Cinematography - https://youtu.be/oUrS6BTviEA

In Retrospect | Lady Bird (Video Essay) - https://youtu.be/1cc6eOzDyCE

Lady Bird: Love is Attention - https://youtu.be/E5zdyuRMb1Y

Lady Bird: Love and Attention | Video Essay - https://youtu.be/erkRWLiSdc4

Lady Bird — The Meaning of Love - https://youtu.be/1DAKTJ510ms

How Greta Gerwig Writes Acceptance | Lady Bird - https://youtu.be/Eg5DrmdxBvM

Greta Gerwig Writes What She Knows (and She Knows a Lot) - https://youtu.be/842dOY4KJ1M

What's So Great About Lady Bird | Video Essay - https://youtu.be/eZL9ZPKfB6s

Lady Bird | A Filmmaker's Analysis - https://youtu.be/BwxKiX8o2D8

How Greta Gerwig’s Brilliant Use of Colors Turned ‘Lady Bird’ Into an Emotional Nostalgia Trip - https://www.indiewire.com/2017/12/lady-bird-greta-gerwig-color-sam-levy-1201907175/

How Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird Came to “Look Like a Memory” - https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2017/11/greta-gerwig-lady-bird-design